


Touch

by sardonicsmiley



Category: Stargate:Atlantis
Genre: Episode: s02e03 Runner, F/M, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-07-29
Updated: 2006-07-29
Packaged: 2021-01-04 19:48:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21203096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sardonicsmiley/pseuds/sardonicsmiley
Summary: "Can I touch you?" His voice is very quiet, and for a moment she sits, stunned,and tries to analyze that question.





	Touch

**Author's Note:**

> Not romance, just...I don't know. Ronon's hotness inspired me something bad, ok?

She is hot, tired, and her whole body feels achy and tense from stress. The pressures of the last few weeks are finally starting to wear her out, and the events of the day seem to be destined to bring the exhaustion she's been grappling with to a head. She fears she might fall asleep at any moment, and for a brief moment she wonders if maybe it's the radiation that this planet is supposedly full of. Radiation poisoning would be great, just what she needed...

There is silence around her, which is odd, because her curious captor has been fiercely talkative and inquisitive for most of the hours that they have sat alone in this cave. He has wanted to know everything about her life, her home, her friends, and in turn shared everything about himself. When he speaks of his home his eyes soften, and the blaster wanders away from her. Eventually it doesn't wander back. But there is silence now, and there has been for an indeterminate amount of time. That silence, coupled with his piercing stare, are stealing away what little comfort she has left.

She wishes she could tell what he is thinking, but his pale eyes and hard face reveal nothing. The blaster lays on the ground beside him, and she doesn't know if he's laid it down because he no longer thinks she'll try to escape, or if he merely knows that he could stop her easily enough without it. She tries to relax, to let her mind wander to the little safe-haven of fantasy that she's had since she was a child, but his frightfully intense stare doesn't allow her to. She shifts, uncomfortable on the hard ground, and with his bright eyes drilling into her.

And then, out of the blue, he says, "Can I touch you?" His voice is very quiet, and for a moment she sits, stunned, and tries to analyze that question. His hands are clasped very tightly together against his chest, and she can see the muscles jumping in his biceps at random intervals. His face is as calm as ever, but there is something bright and desperate moving inside his eyes. And she thinks, 'How long has it been since he's been able to touch anyone?' There is no conceivable way she could tell him no.

She takes a deep breath, and says, "Yes," because her throat is suddenly too tight to say anything else. He unfolds like a spring, one second reclining against the cave wall opposite her, the next crouched in front of her on his knees. His hands hover over her shoulders, and then a shadow dances across his face, and he swears in some tongue that she does not know, and rocks back on his heels. He reaches for the Lt. Colonel's pack, and tears through it like a desperate man.

He comes away with a strip of cloth in his hands, and as she watches, fascinated, he rubs fiercely at his hands. There is silence as he scrubs, and then he lets the cloth fall to the ground, and stares down at his hands for a moment. The cloth is soiled, and his hands are a vicious pink color from the fury of the scrubbing. They apparently meet his inspection for cleanliness, because he is in front of her again, eyes darting across her, as though he is unsure where to begin.

She takes mercy on him, and cautiously extends a hand towards his, and like a magnet his fingers find hers. He engulfs her hand with both of his, and she feels the shuddering breath that escapes him. For a moment there is relative stillness, as his fingers rub slow lazy circles across the back of her hand and her palm, as he traces the lines of her fingers, and then her veins. He follows them back to her wrist, and then up her arm. He is moving with painstaking slowness, as though he is trying to commit every inch of her to memory. His eyes follow the path of his hand, and he chews thoughtfully on his bottom lip. He reaches the edge of her sleeve, and stops.

There is silence, stillness, and then his hands jump to her neck, slide up and cup her chin for a sliver of time. They dance across her brow and her cheekbones, across her jaw line and a thumb slides experimentally over her lips. There is another long, shaking breath from him, as his thumb rests against her bottom lip. His other hand slides across her cheek, and nestles behind her ear and for a split second she thinks he will kiss her. And then his eyes drift half-closed, and the hand that hand been resting against her mouth is wound into her hair.

He is closer to her then, and he buries his face in her hair, runs his hands threw it, and somewhere in the back of his throat there is a faint whimpering sound. She feels rooted to the spot, and yet she itches to take some kind of action. She is shocked, and not ashamed to admit, quiet pleasantly so. She is not sure what possesses her to reach her arms out, and carefully wrap them around his back, but at their touch he is suddenly holding her so tightly that she can barely breath.

His face has found its way to her neck, and he holds her in a vise so tight that her ribs seem to groan. She stares into the middle distance, and tries to understand all that has just happened. He is making odd little chirping sounds that remind her of baby animals everywhere. They stay like this for an amount of time that she can't track, and then the stress and exhaustion break down the last of her walls, and she sleeps, with a strange, possibly dangerous man cradled against her. She wouldn't have it any other way.


End file.
